Instinct
by CrackDragon42
Summary: A kidnapped woman is left in Sherlock and John's flat, but she isn't an ordinary woman - she's a werewolf. What happens when this female werewolf bites the Consulting Detective and ex-army Doctor? She stays and helps them through it. Sherlock/OC/John.
1. Prank Call

**Disclaimer** I don't own _Sherlock_, Sherlock Holmes or John Watson. Or Jim Moriarty. The program is owned by the BBC, Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss. If I'd owned the show, I'd know how Sherlock survived that fall (It's driving me crazy. Seriously!)

**Author's Note **This is my first fanfiction so I hope it's interesting enough. This is a love-triangle story between Sherlock, John and my OC - because I couldn't resist.

**A/N PS. **This story will be taking place just after Sherlock and John's first encounter with Moriarty, but before the Irene Adler case. This chapter happens during the pool scene though.

* * *

_"Monsters are real, and ghosts are real too.  
They live inside us, and sometimes, they  
__win."  
__- Stephen King_

**Chapter 1 – Prank Call**

11.42pm, Saturday night. Party time. The weekend clubbers were just getting started and there was no stopping them, but the the fun is over for those who were less than careful.

The Ambulance service of Birmingham were rushed off their feet, stretching their resources wafer thin as they checked on the nocturnal wildlife of the party scene. Stitches, casts, x-rays and stomach's pumped would be needed. A lot.

Ellie Monroe, a paramedic approaching her sixth year on the job, was only a few hours away from clocking out and getting home to her cosy flat. There had been a few memorable incidents during the beginning of her shift, one of which included a heavily intoxicated young man who'd fallen and broken his ankle - he'd went and gotten a tattoo before hand... Of a _Tesco_ carrier bag on his shoulder. He'd be regretting it in the morning.

Ellie was currently helping her partner, first year paramedic Eoin Curtis, lift an unconscious teenager who had been found by a bouncer at one of the local clubs onto a stretcher to be taken in to the A&E to be looked over.

Through the open driver's side door, the Ambulance call-radio crackled to life on the dashboard.

Ellie lifted the walkie-talkie connected to the radio and held in the talk button, "This is Monroe, go ahead." - and let go of the button.

"Possible stabbing. Young man, early twenties, sounds like a mugging gone wrong. Are you available?" A voice replied.

"I'm free," Ellie informed the operator, seeing that Eoin had the situation with the teenager under control. The operator gave her the address. "I'll be there ASAP." - she dropped the talkie into the shelf beneath the radio.

"Well?" Eoin called over.

"Possible stabbing, shouldn't take too long. You stay here and make sure he's okay," Ellie instructed as she climbed into the Ambulance and started the engine. "I'll be back in a few, behave yourself."

Being a Sunday morning, the roads leading to her destination were practically empty. Reaching the address in record time, she discovered the house was abandoned. The front garden was overgrown and wild, the paint on the front door was peeling, the most of the windows were shattered. It was more than likely a gag, someone drunk got daring and phoned for an ambulance. But just in case...

'_This_ _better_ _not_ _be_ _a_ _prank._' Ellie growled in her head as she killed the engine and climbed out, sporting her dark green trousers and matching tunic beneath an identically coloured jacket.

The door creaked open as she rapped her knuckles on the cracked wood, "Hello?" - no reply.

Cautiously Ellie stepped into the house, not knowing what to expect, running several possibilities through her head. The wooden floorboards groaned and squeaked under her weight as she moved forward, medical kit in hand.

There was no light in the house (the electricity probably didn't work), but it wasn't a problem, Ellie could see just as well in the dark as she could have if the lights had been on. She sniffed the air, her nose twitching as she picked up someone's scent, along with the metallic stench of blood hanging in the air.

Ellie Monroe wasn't human, she was beyond human – she was a Lycanthrope. A Werewolf. And it helped a lot in her job.

"Right, I know there's someone in here! I'm not playing games!" She announced, heading into the (what must have been) the living room.

Lying in the middle of the room, motionless and not breathing, was a man on his stomach - a pool of dark red blood spread out over the floor beneath him.

Ellie rushed forward and checked for a pulse, when she didn't find one, she gently rolled the man over onto his back so that she could see how bad the wound was. It wasn't just a wound, it was a gaping slice the whole way across his abdomen, which explained why there was so much blood.

She searched for any kind of Id, and came upon a wallet in the right pocket of the man's jeans. Bruno Grey, 25, from Swansea. Probably traveled with a group of friends for a fun weekend and got more than he bargained for. There was no pulse, and he wasn't breathing. He'd been left to bleed out for at least an hour. Until a further inspection, the cause of death would have to be massive blood-loss.

"Police. Great," Ellie sighed as she stood and pulled out her mobile, hitting 999 and about to press the call button when a loud clatter erupted from the kitchen and into the small living room. A chair, or something similar, had been knocked over. "Hello?"

"Put the phone down." A gruff voice ordered out of sight. Ellie wasn't entirely sure what to do, she was frozen in surprise. "I said put down the phone!"

Without another moments hesitation, she dropped her phone. It landed on Grey's stomach and bounced off, landing on the floor with a thud, "Okay, okay. Look, see? I dropped it."

"Keep your hands where I can see them, I don't trust _your _kind." A man, around the same height as herself with dark brown hair, slowly padded into the living room, a black pistol held out in front of him directed at her. And then she caught the unforgettable aroma of earth and metal, with a hint of overconfidence and stupidity. The man was a hunter, and he'd be best to know what he was dealing with.

"What do you want?" Ellie growled harshly, she had no respect for hunters. She'd come across a few of them over the years, the first when she'd been seven years old – her father had quickly taken care of him though. From the man's accent, she could tell he was from Northern Ireland, he had the natural twang of a Belfast native. Her eyes blazed silver, glowing monstrously in the dark.

Hunters were humans, nothing compared to a werewolf, they weren't exactly normal. Hunters were born into a hunting family and brought up knowing about the things that go bump in the night. They were a lot more... Robust than regular humans, able to go head-to-head and survive a supernatural attack. There senses were more sensitive, no where near par to a werewolf's, but more than the average person. People didn't just become hunters, it was in their blood.

"Word on the street is, Moriarty's looking for a Werewolf," He grinned, pulling back the hammer of the pistol with his thumb. "I don't care why he needs one, or what he'll do with it, but he's offering anyone who can bag one three and a half grand. I'd have done it for one."

"And who's Moriarty?" She snorted, it sounded like the name of a villain from an old book. The hunter chuckled at her question and pulled out his own phone, dialing a number before pressing the mobile to his ear.

"He's a man with a plan." He smirked as he squeezed his index finger and pulled the trigger. A deadly bang rang throughout the empty house.

***I*N*S*T*I*N*C*T***

Miles away, in a leisure centre in London, three men stood beside a swimming pool. The room was fairly well lit, the light reflecting off the surface of the water.

Sherlock Holmes, the only known consulting detective of Baker Street, stood stony faced and pointing a gun at a coat lying between him and another man. The other man was the infamous Jim Moriarty, Consulting criminal for those in need of his services. The coat was not all that it appeared, for hidden inside the bundle of material was a bomb.

John Watson, Army doctor and companion of Sherlock Holmes, stayed crouched trying to catch his breath and slow down his hammering heart. For not only were there snipers pointing guns at him, he had once been wearing the bomb-coat.

The two men, Consulting detective and criminal, were waiting for the other to make the first move. Jim smiling with his hands in his pockets, Sherlock tense with the gun aimed at the bomb, and then...

_Stayin' Alive _by the Bee Gees began playing, the opening tune echoing throughout the room.

Sherlock and John glance around, trying to find where the music is coming from before their eyes fall on Moriarty as he rolls his eyes and sighs, "Do you mind if I get that?"

"Oh no, please," Sherlock gestures for him to go ahead with the gun. "You've got the rest of your life."

Jim pulled out his phone and clicked the answer button, cutting off the song, "Hello?"

"_Is this Jim Moriarty?_" A man with a Northern Irish accent asked.

"Yes of course it is, what do you want?" Jim rolled his eyes again before mouthing 'sorry' to Sherlock, who in return sarcastically mouths 'oh, it's fine'.

"_I heard you were looking for a_ _werewolf,_" The man replied. "_I__ have one here for you-_"

"Say that again!" Jim snarled into the phone, deciding whether to finish Sherlock off now, or do it later. "Say that again, and know that if you're lying to me, I will find you and I will _skin_ you."

"_Trust me, Mr Moriarty, you won't be disappointed,_" He chuckled at the outburst. "_Phone me back if you're interested._"

"Wait," Jim ordered and lowered his phone, walking forward until he came to within mere inches of the bomb as Sherlock tightened his grip on the gun. "Sorry, wrong day to die."

"Oh. Did you get a better offer?" Sherlock asked in mock-curiosity, to which Jim glanced down at his phone.

"You'll be hearing from me, Sherlock," The Consulting criminal promised as he began walking away, lifting his phone back up to his ear. "So if you have what you say you have, I'll make you rich. If you don't, I'll turn you into shoes." - he snapped his fingers before he exited the swimming pool area, calling off the snipers.

Sherlock quickly jerked his gun up towards the viewing area behind them, making sure the snipers had left, ready to shoot any who lingered. John breathed heavily beside him, not sure what to do next.

"What happened there?" The doctor settled on asking.

"Someone changed his mind," Sherlock finally looked down at John, going to help him up. "Question is; who?"

* * *

**I'm not entirely sure how I came up with this idea, it was a while back now.** **But hopefully I tried to get across what I'd been trying to do.**

**If you see anything wrong, or I haven't explained anything, please review or PM me so I can fix it.**

**I've been obsessing over this chapter for _days_ now, going over and over it trying make it how I imagined it. It's close, really close, there's still something missing though... Damn, can't put my finger on it.**

**I'll be aiming to try and update this story every Saturday, and if all goes according to plan, it should work out fine. And the next chapter will be much longer.**


	2. Turning Point

**Disclaimer** I don't own _Sherlock_, Sherlock Holmes or John Watson. The program is owned by the BBC, Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss. If I'd owned the show, I'd know how Sherlock survived that fall (It's driving me crazy. Seriously!)

**Author's Note **Chapter three is also finished, I plan to be a few chapters ahead so that I'm not rushing. I want to get as many chapters as I can written, but still have them a good length. I went a little overboard with this, it ended up being twice as long as I'd originally thought. There was just so much I wanted to get into it. Enjoy!

* * *

_"All that we see or seem, is  
but a dream within a dream."  
- Edgar Allan Poe_

**Chapter 2 - Turning Point**

_Thursday, 6.24pm. Five days after the Pool Incident._

"Why did I have to come with you?" Sherlock huffed as he and John entered 221B Baker Street, shopping bags from _Tesco _in each of their hands. "I could have been doing something more useful."

Seeing that the fridge had been void of proper food (and not just body parts), John had decided on going round to the local shop for a spot of grocery shopping. Seeing his estranged flatmate doing nothing but lying on his settee, John had decided to include the Consulting detective in his trip to the supermarket.

"You had to come with me because I couldn't carry it all by myself," John reasoned as they climbed the stairs, he'd also wanted to get Sherlock out of the flat – he hadn't moved in four days. "And getting food _is _useful."

It was when they reached their flat that John was thankful he'd been carrying the eggs, for no sooner had Sherlock unlocked the door did he drop the groceries to the floor in favour of taking off his jacket and flinging it over the arm of the sofa.

"Food is so trivial." Sherlock mocked, but lifted the carrier bags out of the doorway so that John could walk in without the threat of tripping over them.

John stopped abruptly on his way into the kitchen, staring in disbelief at what was in front of him. Sherlock's experiments on the table were ignored, the dirty dishes in the sink were ignored, the bag of thumbs on the worktop beside the fridge were ignored. Sitting in one of their kitchen chairs, facing out into the living room, was an unconscious young girl. No, not a girl, a young _woman_.

"Sherlock," John called, not sure whether it was his flatmate's doing or not. "Can you come here a minute."

"I helped you bring it back, I'm not helping you put it away." Was Sherlock's reply.

"It's not about the shopping, get over here." John ordered, and for once Sherlock listened, perhaps picking up on the panic rising in John's voice.

"What is it?" Demanded Sherlock as he stepped to John's side, but the question didn't need answered as he spotted what was causing John to worry. "Oh, I see."

The woman, possibly in her late twenties, was unconscious. Her short light brown hair was messy and un-kept, her pale skin lightly freckled. She was wearing a plain white short sleeved shirt, streaks of red ruined the right side. She was also wearing loose green trousers and black socks, no shoes. What stood out the most wasn't her lack of shoes, or the fact she sat slumped in a chair with her hands tied behind her back, but the deep round stains that covered the knees of her trousers.

"Tell me you didn't do this." John finally said, not taking his eyes away from the unconscious stranger.

"I didn't do this," Sherlock stated bluntly. "I've been at _Tesco _for the past hour."

"Then we've got a problem." John set the shopping bags down on the coffee table and stepped towards the woman, rolling the sleeves of his jumper to his elbows before tilting her head back so he could check her eyes; first the right, then the left. "She's got a mild concussion, probably a few bruises, but that's all I can tell." - he checked the pockets of her trousers, one was empty and other held a broken mobile phone - "No Id, can't even tell who she is or where she's from."

"Her name is Eleanor Monroe, she's a paramedic from Birmingham. She went missing five days ago. Her jacket was removed because she'd injured her kidnapper, her shoes could have told us where she'd been so they had to go. The blood on her shirt is her own, the blood on her knees is from a third party," Sherlock looked up from his phone, turning it round to show John a smiling picture of the woman in her uniform on the screen, her shining eyes were a soft grey. "She was kept in the back of a _Renault Trafic_ with no food, her kidnapper drove to London from Birmingham to drop her off – which was the only time out of those five days she left the van. Whoever she was dropped off to obviously waited until everyone was out of the house to leave her at her final destination."

"You got all that from your phone and a bit of blood?" John shouldn't have been surprised, he'd watched the Consulting detective deducing things for a while now, but he never ceased to be amazed.

"I've worked with less," Sherlock studied her again, knowing he'd have to explain to John_ how _he'd come to those conclusions. "Searched for women gone missing over the past week, she was relatively easy to find. The blood on her knees, too much to be hers and too much to be her kidnappers, so there had to be a third person – probably dead by now. The blood on her shirt is hers, judging from the angle, I'd say it came from her right palm."

John carefully turned the woman's right hand over, revealing deep scratches in the centre of her hand that were in the middle of healing, "You're right, of course you're right."

"Now, she reeks of very specific cleaning chemicals, only used by _Aramark_, and the company's mobile staff only uses the _Renault Trafic _model. And if you've kidnapped someone, the last thing you're going to do is let them wander about, get the chance to escape, so she never left the van." Sherlock deduced in one breath, almost complete, the only thing that interested him was how she got into the flat. "No food? Look at her shirt. Besides the blood, it's as clean as when she'd first put it on her, if she'd been fed in a moving van there would be stains all over it."

The woman groaned as she started coming around, startling John as he'd been right beside her. She wriggled a little, sitting straighter in the chair as she slowly cracked open her left eye, she didn't seem to be able to focus and so closed her eye with a pained exhale of breath.

"We need to untie her." John muttered as he began looking for a pair of black-handled scissors he remembered seeing in the kitchen somewhere.

Sherlock scrolled through his contacts, quickly coming to the Ls and selecting the one he'd been looking for. It rang once, twice, and started ringing a third time just as the call was answered.

"_What is it, Sherlock?_" Detective Inspector Greg Lestrade asked, not sure if he was going to regret it now or later that he hadn't ignored the call.

"Missing paramedic from Birmingham, heard anything about it?" Sherlock questioned instead, she had obviously been dropped off in 221B for a reason. What reason? He wasn't sure yet, but he had an idea.

"_Birmingham has their own police force, they'd be dealing with any missing people cases-_"

"Have you heard anything about it?" Sherlock repeated himself, cutting the DI off.

"_Female, went missing near the end of her shift last Saturday, reported missing the morning after – never showed for work. They found her keys and the ambulance she'd been driving at an address she'd went to check a stabbing at, along with her wallet and the burnt remains of her jacket and shoes,_" Lestrade replied, sighing into the phone – he was sitting at his desk sifting through a mountain of paperwork, the last thing on his mind was a missing paramedic who was out of his jurisdiction. "_Why are you so interested in a missing woman? People go missing every day, what makes this one so special?_"

As Sherlock had been questioning Lestrade, John had searched and failed in locating the scissors.

"This must be Thursday," John grumbled to himself as he went with his second best option – he grabbed a sharp knife from one of the drawers. "I never could get the hang of Thursdays."

Unfortunately, as John pulled the knife out from beneath a pile of smaller, duller knives, the woman groggily looked over her shoulder at him. The appearance of the knife had her alert and alarmed in seconds, which was when she finally noticed she was somewhere new and unfamiliar.

"What're you doing with that?" She demanded, jumping to her feet as John stepped towards her, knocking the chair over as she went – the wooden chair clattered to the wooden floor hollowly, making the distinct sound only wood being hit by wood would make. "Get away from me!"

Having not stood used her legs in five days, her knees buckled under her weight and she fell to a kneeling position on the floor. She tried to stand again, but again she fell to her knees.

"Wait! Hang on! I'm trying to-"

"Back _off_!" She snarled, baring her teeth as he'd moved to help her up, and it was so feral that it even managed to silence Sherlock (however briefly it may have been). It was definitely not a noise a human was capable of making, an animal of some kind perhaps – a dog maybe, or a wolf – but not a human. It stopped John in his tracks. Using the wall, she pushed herself to her feet and stood on shaky legs.

"_Sherlock! Why do you want to know-_"

"Just following up on something." Sherlock cut Lestrade off again, hanging up before he could ask any more questions.

Sherlock studied the woman's body language as she was focused on John; how she faced him head-on even though her arms were tied behind her back, how she stood to her full height (level with, if not slightly shorter than, John) with her shoulders squared. She was tense, every muscle coiled and ready to spring.

"We're not going to hurt you." John promised, shuffling forward just a little, watching as her lips curled in a silent snarl – this was when he noticed that both sets of her cuspids were pointed, they looked more like canine teeth than they should have and they seemed to be... Growing.

"Where am I?" She growled, spotting Sherlock and maneuvering herself so that her back was still to a wall, but she could see the both of them. Her shoulders shifted and popped as she tried to loosen the rope around her wrists, it was slowly working.

"London." Sherlock answered, her eyes caught his and if he hadn't been the highly observant person that he was, he probably would have missed the flash of silver that took over the grey of her eyes. He noticed the information about her current location made her tense up even more, if that were possible.

"No, seriously. Tell me, now." She scoffed, if she was where they said, how had she gotten there from Birmingham?

"You're in London," John repeated as sincerely as he could, and failed to notice her coiled muscles as he moved towards her – the knife still in hand. "If you'd just let me-"

As John had raised his hand with the knife in it, the woman had jolted forward and sank her unusually shaped teeth into the doctor's forearm, his hand sprang open and dropped the knife noisily to the floor. She opened her jaws and ran, her speed surprising Sherlock as she raced past him and out the open door.

Sherlock, without a second thought, sprinted after her down the stairs, the rope from around the woman's wrists lay uselessly on the last step as she yanked open the front door to 221B Baker Street. Not aware of the steps ahead of her, she glanced back at Sherlock as she ran forward. Her body hit the pavement with a heavy thud as she completely missed both steps and tripped, but before she could get up, Sherlock was upon her.

Grabbing her by her upper arms, the Consulting detective hauled her to her feet, only to feel the sharp piercing of her teeth as they sliced through his shirt and into his shoulder. Sherlock hissed at the unexpected pain, his grip loosening enough for her to pull free and dash down the street. He knew she didn't know where she was going, and that he couldn't let her get away. Was she a present from Moriarty? Someone new? Wrong address maybe? It didn't matter, he had to catch her.

Using his vast knowledge of London's streets, Sherlock took a slight detour and arrived at the end of Baker Street before his target – who ended up colliding with him. A woman in bloodied clothes with no shoes on running down the street definitely turned a few heads, especially when Sherlock swiftly hefted her over his shoulder, his injury hidden by her abdomen and out of sight.

"Let me go!" She ordered, smacking his back with the side of her balled fist as she struggled. "This isn't funny!"

"If you keep wriggling, I'll just let you fall, Eleanor." Sherlock said evenly, his left arm curled around the back of her knees. As her name was mentioned, she stilled and stopped hitting him.

On their way back to 221B, they were given odd looks from passers by, their curiosity sky-rocketing as they watched the unusual pair.

Promptly reaching the open door to 221B Baker Street, Sherlock pulled Eleanor off his shoulder and dropped her onto her feet. He pointed wordlessly into flat, and instead of protesting or fleeing again, she complied and rushed in – her socked feet made soft thuds as she took the stairs two at a time.

The three of them - John still in the kitchen holding a tea towel to his forearm, Eleanor tensely in the middle of the living room chewing her bottom lip, and Sherlock in the doorway with his right hand placed firmly against his shoulder - stood in an awkward silence, not quite sure how to proceed.

"Why did you bite me?" John nearly whispered the question, but she'd caught it.

"I'm dazed, confused, disorientated and frightened and you came at me with a knife. What was I supposed to do, start crying?" Eleanor rubbed her wrists where rope burns marked her skin red, avoiding eye contact. She shifted from one foot to the other, her muscles tensed and ready to act on her fight or flight instinct.

"And me?" Sherlock asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I didn't know what you were going to do with me, I still don't actually, but it was just a reflex." Eleanor answered, and he could tell she was telling the truth. "I'm sorry, by the way. For biting both of you."

"I won't need stitches, it wasn't too deep." John peeled the small towel away from his arm to show the two his wound, it had stopped bleeding and slowly clotted.

"Can I take a closer look at it?" Eleanor asked cautiously, only moving slowly after John had eventually nodded his head. She gently wrapped her fingers around his forearm, lightly prodding the skin around the injury where a rash had started to develop. She let go of John's forearm with a grimace before looking over to Sherlock, watching him for a moment like he'd done to her since he'd brought her back. "Could I check yours?"

Sherlock had been about to give her more than an earful, but something about the way she wrung her hands nervously and chewed her bottom lip made him stop, instead deciding to simply nod before unbuttoning the first few buttons of his shirt so he could slide his bare shoulder out into the open. Sherlock's wound looked deeper than John's, but he wouldn't need stitches either – the same rash had started developing around his injury as well, almost identical to John's.

Leaving Eleanor in the living room by herself, Sherlock and John quietly decided what they were going to do with her in the kitchen.

"You have to phone Lestrade and tell him we found her." John started, glancing at their visitor as she stared our the window before back at his flatmate.

"She was left here for a reason, John, it wasn't random," Sherlock voiced his conclusion. "We can't let her go, she might know something."

"Jesus, Sherlock, she's been missing for _five _days." John argued, his morals on the subject unchangeable. "Phone Lestrade, he'll-"

"Want to bring her to the Yard and question her," Sherlock butted in, correcting and finishing the doctor's sentence. "We need to question her _first, _then maybe call Lestrade tomorrow."

"She's not a stray, we can't just keep her," This was going nowhere, and John knew it. Eleanor would be staying with them regardless of what he thought. "And besides that, she was kidnapped and trapped in a can for five days, how do you think she feels being dragged into this?"

"This has to be Moriarty," Sherlock thought aloud, ignoring what John had just said. "But why? Why her? What's so special about her?"

"Maybe he thought she was cute?" John suggested, having one more peak into the living room at Eleanor as she was studying their bookcase, he couldn't stop his eyes from wandering up and down her body appreciatively.

"She's not his type." Sherlock dismissed offhandedly, only partially listening. "Whoever kidnapped her must have been the same person who phoned at the pool, it would make sense."

"What do we do then?" John was usually hesitant when asking Sherlock about his plans because it sometimes didn't go well for them, they'd get shot at; drugged, attacked, kidnapped, robbed, threatened – it seemed never ending sometimes.

"We need her to cooperate with us," Sherlock replied simply. "She _has _to know _something_."

"If you asked her nicely, I'm sure she would be more than willing to help you catch the bastards who kidnapped her." Eleanor called in from the living room, she was now sitting on the sofa, Sherlock's coat folded neatly beside her.

John's cheeks blushed light pink, "Why don't we just as her?"

"Excellent idea, John." Sherlock bound into the living room and stopped in front of the brunette woman. "From the beginning, before you were kidnapped and after."

"I left my partner at the hospital with one of our earlier patients, I'd been radioed about a bog standard stabbing – I was told a possible mugging gone wrong," Eleanor started, remembering all she could about the night. "I pulled up at the house and it looked abandoned, but I went inside to check just in case."

"And then you found the body." Sherlock figured out the next part and nodded as John joined them briefly to lift the shopping bags off the coffee table and into the kitchen.

"I obviously looked for a pulse, when I couldn't find one, I turned him over on to his back," She chose not to ask how he'd known about the body. "His stomach had been slit the whole way across," - she ran her index finger horizontally across her abdomen as an example - "He would have bled out in minutes, he'd have died within the first half hour."

"Were you knocked out? Held at gunpoint? Drugged?"

"When I was checking the body, I heard a noise coming from the kitchen. This guy with a gun came out and pointed it at me," She continued, but Sherlock could tell there was something she was holding back on, it was subtle, but enough for him to pick up on it. "Said something about a guy named Moriarty, then knocked me out."

"Moriarty! I knew it!" Sherlock exclaimed, it had been the strongest theory of his.

"The rest is kind of a blur, and then I woke up here," Eleanor finished, running her right thumb subconsciously across a thin scar stretching over the back of her left hand at a slanted angle. "You know the rest. Who's Moriarty?"

"Consulting criminal, best of the bad apparently," Sherlock answered, his mind thinking of possible reasons why he had someone kidnap this ordinary woman and have her brought all the way to their flat. "Not important though – what are you hiding?"

"Hiding? I'm not hiding-"

"Liar. It must be a pretty big secret if it nearly cost you your life, what is it?" Sherlock stepped on and over the coffee table towards her.

"I can't tell you," Eleanor sighed, looking up from the scar on her hand into his eyes. "I want to, and I'll have to soon, but I can't right now."

"Why not?" He was curious now, intrigued at the information being kept from him.

"I don't trust you enough," She replied honestly, and the Consulting detective believed her. "Not yet, anyway."

"Tea?" John asked after a moment of silence had past, he peered in just to make sure they hadn't killed each other.

"God, yes. Milky, two sugars." Eleanor said with a small smile, one that made the ex-army doctor feel appreciated, before she looked back at Sherlock. "Coffee man, right? Black... not sure how many sugars."

"Two," Sherlock said with a raised eyebrow. "Two sugars."

"You stink of coffee," She answered his unasked question. "Too strong to be diluted with milk, not sweet enough for me to smell the sugar."

"That's quite the nose you have there." He spoke flatly, unimpressed by the observation. "You have to stay here for tonight, probably most of tomorrow."

"I know."

"Then I'll phone Lestrade, he'll phone the Birmingham police and you'll be home before dinner." Sherlock calculated in his head, they would keep her at the Yard for a few hours, get her to tell them every detail, then finally get her off home.

"Where am I sleeping tonight?" Eleanor asked next, the settee was comfy enough to sit on, but she didn't know if she fancied _sleeping_ on it.

"You can have my room, I'll take the sofa." John offered, handing Eleanor her cup of tea as she stood to take it and Sherlock his coffee.

"No, I couldn't put you out like that-"

"She'll sleep in my room," Sherlock spoke up, taking a sip of his black coffee, enjoying the slight buzz the caffeine gave him. John stared at him in disbelief he knew the Consulting detective wasn't really the sharing type. "The sheets were changed yesterday."

"Oh, um... Thanks- I mean thank you," Eleanor nodded, heading towards the door on the other side of the kitchen after Sherlock pointed to it, she brought her tea with her. "I think I'll turn in early."

"Okay." John replied, seeing that Sherlock wasn't going to. "Night."

"Night." She copied as she stepped through the door and closed it behind her.

Sherlock sipped his coffee again before collapsing into his chair, setting it on the small table beside him and lifting his violin. He plucked a few strings, his mind wandering to the infamous Moriarty as he picked up his bow and began playing a soft melody. John pulled the sleeves of his jumper up to his elbows and set about cleaning the dishes in the sink, then gave the flat a quick once over to make sure he hadn't missed any.

"Well, I think I'll head up now," John announced as he dried his hands off on a tea towel an hour and a half later, Sherlock had stopped playing his violin twenty minutes beforehand and instead sat reading a book with no title on it. "Try not to make a mess."

Sherlock shut the book with a loud _smack! _as John ascended the stairs to his own room and stood, dropping the hardback onto the table beside John's laptop. He was still fully dressed, and knowing he wouldn't be comfortable until he got his pyjamas on, Sherlock stalked through the kitchen and slowly opened his bedroom door. He paused for a moment in the doorway, but after hearing nothing proceeded into his room.

Eleanor lay in the middle of his bed curled up on her side facing away from the door, her breathing was soft but a little sporadic. She shifted a bit as Sherlock stepped into the room, settling seconds later as he pulled open a drawer and lifted out a pair of pyjama bottoms and a loose white shirt to go with it, he grabbed his most favourite dressing gown off the back of the door as he left and closed it behind him.

Sherlock swiftly changed and dumped his clothes in a pile on his chair, collapsing comfortably into the sofa, _his _sofa. His limbs became heavy, he stifled a yawn behind a hand as he stretched out across the seat cushions. His eyelids slid shut, and before he had the chance to fight it, he'd fallen asleep – joining his flatmate and their guest in the Land of Nod.

* * *

**And this is where the fun begins, I can't wait to post the next chapter.**

**Any spelling mistakes? I'd love it if you'd tell me, I want to make this story the best it can be. Comment and tell me where, or send a PM my way.**


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